'The war couldn't split us up so why should social services?' say devoted couple who fear they could be separated after 60 years

So Thomas and Iris Bashford should have been looking forward to marking 60 years of commitment and devotion with their diamond wedding anniversary.

But social services officials have given them the devastating news that they could be living apart by the time their anniversary comes around later this year.

Mr Bashford, an 82-year-old war veteran, may be moved to a care home, while his 81-year-old wife, who is blind and dependent on him, will remain in the couple's sheltered housing.

Facing separation: Blind Iris Bashford, 81, and her husband Thomas, 82, face being split up after council chiefs decided they cannot be cared for at the same residential home

Mr Bashford, in hospital after a heart attack and a number of other health problems, said he was appalled at the treatment he and his wife were receiving. 'I feel pretty grim about the future,' he said. 'The war didn't split us up but now this could.

'I never thought I would see the day when I was separated from my wife. We have both worked our whole life, paying into the system, and I am not happy that we are being treated like this.'

Mrs Bashford added: 'I don't want to be without him  -  I am very upset and angry. Things would have been different years ago. Old people used to be treated differently.'

Mr Bashford, who ran a decorating business until he retired, has been told he will be allowed to live in a residential home once he leaves hospital.

But he and his wife, a former seamstress, have been told they cannot both move to the home in Southampton.

The couple's only child, Lynne Kotchie, was horrified when she was told the pair may have to live apart.

She has had one meeting with a team at the hospital made up of medical staff, Hampshire County Council social services and specialists to discuss her father's care.

Wedded bliss: The Bashfords on their wedding day almost 60 years ago

Social services later phoned to say a residential home might be suitable for her father.

Mrs Kotchie, 58, said: 'It was suggested dad could go to a home but funding would not be available for mum.

If they have to split up, it will be like having a limb cut off for them. They just won't survive without each other. I don't know how mum is expected to get by without dad  -  he is her eyes and she can barely move about at home without feeling her way around the furniture.'

Mrs Bashford has mobility problems and relies on her husband for day-to-day care.

The couple have been together for 66 years. They met just before Mr Bashford joined the Navy in 1942 and will celebrate their diamond wedding anniversary in October.

He went to war aboard a minesweeper in the Mediterranean with a picture of his 16-year-old sweetheart in his wallet and they married two years after his return in 1946.

Yesterday, their daughter spoke of her anger at a system capable of tearing a couple apart in their old age.

She said: 'It is appalling that the Government isn't prepared to look after them in their twilight years. We don't know how much time either of them has left and it is a very unfeeling society that would expect them to spend it apart. Very soon there will be many, many couples in the same situation because people are living longer.'

A Southampton University Hospital NHS Trust spokesman said no decision had yet been made and that all options would be looked at in full cooperation with the family.

A Hampshire Primary Care Trust spokesman said it could not talk about individual cases.

Ministers pledged earlier this year to help those who are separated when one has to move into a care home. Health Secretary Alan Johnson urged councils to build more sheltered accommodation for couples.